Personal Trainer Liability Insurance: What Do You Really Need?

The fitness industry, while overflowing with opportunities, is not immune to unexpected challenges. Having the right tools to navigate these moments and the risks they carry can mean the difference between a successful business and closing shop. One of these tools is personal trainer liability insurance. 

Here we’ll explore the world of personal trainer liability insurance – what it is, why it matters, and how it can be a game-changer for a fitness business. Whether you're a fitness expert or someone beginning to consider a career in personal training, this article will shed light on an often-overlooked aspect of the health and wellness industry.

Why is Personal Trainer Liability Insurance Important?

Accidents, injuries, and legal disputes can happen. These challenges put fitness trainers and their clients at risk. This is where liability coverage can act as a safety net. 

Personal trainer insurance offers financial protection and peace of mind during these unforeseen circumstances. As professionals dedicated to improving their clients’ lives, personal trainers must be proactive in safeguarding not only the well-being of those they train but also their own business and interests.

Premises Liability / General Liability Coverage for Fitness Business

Every business, including a fitness business, needs protection in case someone alleges that the activities of that business damaged or hurt them. Most people think of this type of protection as general liability insurance. 

Examples of general liability insurance matters at a fitness studio:

• You are showing a guest around your gym, and they fall.

• Your gym has a small locker room with a shower, and the enclosure leaks. The water migrates through the wall and damages the neighbor’s property. 

• You have a yoga studio or meditation room, and someone leaves the candles lit, the room catches on fire, and the smoke damages the adjacent tenant’s premises.

Weird stuff can happen, and general liability coverage will protect you and your small business when it does. 

Professional Liability Coverage for Personal Trainers

General liability coverage is great, however, certain types of businesses, like personal trainers, need a special form of additional liability insurance called professional liability insurance. When you are a professional, like a doctor, lawyer, physical therapist, nutritionist, personal trainer, or health coach, and you provide professional services or guidance to others, you need professional liability coverage. 

General liability coverage won’t protect you from claims that your services caused an injury to your client. That type of claim is specifically excluded under general liability coverage. That’s where professional liability coverage steps in.

Product Liability Coverage

A separate type of exposure, not covered by general liability or professional liability policies is product liability coverage. This coverage protects you if a product at your gym fails and causes bodily harm or property damage.

For example, you provide your client a weightlifting belt, the belt fails, and the client is injured. A claim that the belt was defective is not covered by either general liability or professional liability. That’s where the protection of products liability insurance coverage comes into play. 

Workers Compensation Insurance

Most personal trainers or coaches operate independently, or work in conjunction with other fitness professionals with whom they have an independent contractor relationship. However, if your business is large enough, and you have employees, you may also need, or be required to carry, workers compensation insurance. 

Workers compensation insurance is a specialized policy, not covered under general liability policies, which protects you if an employee is injured while working for you and claims that the injury was caused as a result of the work they were doing. A fitness professional working as your employee drops a barbell as they are moving across the gym and injures themselves. Workers Compensation Insurance steps in to protect you from this exposure. 

Property Insurance to Protect Your Gym, Exercise Equipment, and Other Items

Liability insurance is designed to cover you, the business owner, for exposures because of injury or damage caused to others. All the examples above, general, professional, product liability and workers compensation insurance are forms of liability insurance. 

But what about accidents that result in damage to your property? That burning candle damages your personal property, or the water leak that ruins your area rug, artwork, or other property. Or someone steals equipment or your laptop from your gym or your car while you are in transit from one training session to another. 

These are all examples of property losses you might experience, and this is where property insurance applies. You will want to do some assessment of the amount of property you have at risk, and purchase coverage to protect you from a loss of that property. 

The Importance of Carefully Selecting Your Fitness Business Insurance Coverage

Selecting the right professional liability insurance is a crucial step for personal trainers to protect themselves and their clients from potential risks and liabilities. Here are some key considerations to help you make an informed decision.

Protecting You Personally

Of all the above coverages that will protect your business, nothing is more important than your professional liability coverage. A common expression you will hear when there is an accident is “Don’t worry about it, that’s what insurance is for.” That’s because in most situations there is really no consequence – it is just an accident, insurance covers it, and we move on. But when the accident involves a personal injury resulting from your professional training or coaching of a client, it is a whole different story. Now, other questions come into focus: Was that really your fault? Is the injury really that bad? Will the person be permanently disabled? Will this impact my job, my reputation? 

These are more serious issues, and that’s why having an insurance company on your side who knows your profession and understands the kind of situations which might arise and result in an injury is so important. In situations like this, you need an insurance company team behind you that is capable, willing, and ready to protect you personally, and this is exactly why the selection of your Professional Liability Insurance team is so important. 

Experience and Know-How

API Fitness is that team. Allied has been engaged in the health and wellness sector, insuring professionals like you, since 1986. With over 150,000 clients insured nationwide, no one has more experience in addressing professional exposures than API Fitness. Our team in-house team of lawyers and national network of defense attorneys has decades of experience in both the legal and the fitness arenas to ensure that you are properly defended when money-seeking personal injury attorneys attack you with spurious allegations. 

Your Reputation Matters

Just as important as know-how and track record is our commitment to defend you. Your reputation is at stake and settling to make things go away doesn’t get the job done. Every claim over $3,000 gets reported to the National Practitioner Databank, and becomes a permanent stain on your record, and potentially impacts your employability and livelihood. 

Line in the Sand

When injuries happen, lines often get blurred – who said what to whom, who did what, was there an existing injury, how serious was it, where were things positioned and who put them there…the list goes on. With Allied, our philosophy and commitment is clear – if you were at fault, will work out a reasonable resolution, but if, as in so many cases, an exaggerated or wholly imaginary allegation is made, we draw a clear line in the sand – we will fight to the end to defend you. Our commitment to protecting you is unyielding. 

API Fitness Has Everything You Need to Cover You Wherever You Go

API Fitness has all the coverage required for you to conduct your personal training and coaching business. Our Professional Practice Policy incorporates all three key liability coverages into one package policy – Professional, General, and Product liability exposures. 

Not only is the coverage comprehensive, but the coverage extends to your activities wherever you are providing training services, as long as you are legally allowed to provide those services in that location. From the beach to your client’s home, to a ski resort in Colorado, to a spa in New Hampshire. The coverage is entirely portable.

We also offer a simple, separate Property policy option to cover the equipment / tools of trade, a unique policy which also travels with you when you are training at offsite locations. And, if you are one of the rare professionals who has employees and needs a Worker’s Compensation Policy or even a more comprehensive Business Owners Policy (BOP) or we can arrange that as well.

Enrolling is extremely simple, a five-to-ten-minute time commitment. Coverage is extremely affordable - from just $60 per year for $1,000,000 in protection exclusively for ISSA members. Just call us at 800-860-8330 or follow the ISSA link to our website at  www.apifitness.com to explore your choices and enroll today. 

ISSA members get a $1-million Insurance Policy for $60 (save $50). Click here to save money and protect your fitness business!